Ghost Haste

by ReGina Welling

  Since then, I’d been slowly clearing out the volume of things in those rooms and supplying the shop with furniture, old glass, and anything else that Jacy thought she could sell. As far as I was concerned, we had a win/win situation going. I made a little extra money, Jacy and Neena had plenty of stock, and eventually, I’d send enough to make a dent in the sheer volume of stuff. My contribution, and the fact that I filled in for Jacy or Neena when they needed a day off, made me feel like I had a stake in the store.

  “Felicity!” I felt a little foolish talking to empty space. “If you’re here, I’d like us to talk. I think I might be able to help you.” Dead quiet. “Felicity?”

  I supposed silence was its own answer.

  “Okay, I guess you don’t want my help.”

  Static electricity crept along my skin, sending pinprick shocks up and down my arms, the sensation teasing the little hairs until they stood at attention. I moved behind the counter and took a seat on the stool Jacy routinely used when her ankles swelled from standing.

  “Show yourself.” I should have added please to the end because my request came off more like an order, and Felicity wasn’t having any of it. One of the round racks began to whirl. Slowly at first, then faster. Jeans whizzed and spun, the speed lifting them higher, arcing them wider, slapping them against other racks of clothing.

  The air vibrated. This was probably how the term poltergeist came to be.

  “That’s quite a show.” I kept my cool, but with some difficulty. Still, my reaction was a lot better than it had been when Hudson popped up the first time. My cool lasted right up until a cut-glass candy dish—one from Catherine’s collection—flew off a shelf and whipped past my ear so close the wind from it blew my hair in my eyes.

  I won’t deny I considered huddling under the counter, but I’m not proud of it. I caught the next thing she tossed at me and channeled my mother’s stern tones. “That is enough!” I roared and then blinked in the near silence with the only noise coming from the rack that still revolved, but more slowly now.

  “I said I was here to help you, but I will rethink the offer if this is how you’re going to behave.”

  From the farthest corner of the store, I heard a muffled, “Sorry.”

  Finally, we had real contact.

  Maybe my knees shook a little as I crossed the room, but I tried not to let my fear show in my outward appearance. For one, I didn’t want a repeat of the past few minutes, and for two, I wanted her to see she could trust me.

  I found Felicity sitting on the floor, her head resting on her drawn-up knees and her body shaking with pent-up fear or frustration. Oftentimes, the two appear the same.

  “Aw, honey.” I wished I could put an arm around her and offer a comforting hug. All I could do was try the verbal version. “I know this is scary.” And not just for her. “But it’s going to be okay.”

  “How?” Her head popped up, and I got my first look at my newest visitor from beyond the grave. Dark hair framed deep-set eyes. I couldn’t help but think she looked like her father—the man who had attacked my father at Halloween. “Exactly how is this okay? No one but you can hear me. My father and mother are gone, and I’m stuck in this—” she grimaced, waved a hand. “Place.”

  “Do you remember what happened to you?” I had to ask. “You know you’re—”

  “Dead? Yeah, I got that. I’m not stupid.”

  The bravado lasted about three more seconds before Felicity’s body quivered. “What’s going to happen to me?”

  Torn between wanting to provide comfort and telling the truth, I said, “I don’t know. What do you remember?”

  I knew as soon as the words left my lips that asking had been a bad idea. Felicity wavered, then disappeared entirely, leaving me to clean up the mess she had made. Wasn’t that the story of my life these days?

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  “MARTHA TIPTON, YOU’RE a half-witted fool.” Hands fisted on her hips, Bess Tate wrinkled her nose and glared. “Nobody wants to go on a picnic in Maine in the middle of February. Ain’t nothing romantic about runny noses and frozen backsides.”

  Privately, I agreed with Bess.

  “People sleep on blocks of ice in those ice hotels.” Whenever anyone disagreed with her, Martha turned mutinous. “And they pay big money to do it, too.”

  In another minute, she’d probably suggest we build one of those in the middle of town to attract tourists. And then Bess’s head would explode.

  “Ladies,” I cut in since none of the others in the small group of women who planned town events seemed inclined to do anything about the bickering. “I’m sure, with all the fine minds in this room, we can come up with a workable solution."

  Before my divorce, I’d done all the event planning for the charity arm of my ex-husband’s family business. Once Martha got a taste of my skills in that area, she’d drafted me to help with her quest to rebuild tourism in the town of Mooselick River.

  The latest scheme, I’d come to suspect, was more for my benefit than that of padding the town coffers. Martha aimed to get me paired up with a man. Martha was going to be sorely disappointed.

  I mean, she was nice enough and everything, so were the rest of the older women who worked tirelessly for the town, but I wasn’t going to date some guy just because they thought I should.

  “Bess is right.” Siding with the most vocally contentious of the group might not win me any favors, but I had to call them like I saw them. “The average temperature in Maine in the middle of February is a little too cold for outdoor dining.”

  “What if we rented a couple dozen of those outdoor heaters?” Martha suggested. “They had them at the botanical gardens when they put on the Christmas light show.”

  “You mean that one you went to down on the coast last year?” Bess gave Martha a beady-eyed stare. “The one where you complained for a week how you should have worn Long Johns and a second pair of pants? Been a long time since I went on a date, but thermal undies ain’t exactly my idea of romantic attire.”

  “What do you think, Everly?” Patricia Croft had no way of knowing how hard I’d been biting the inside of my cheek to keep my composure, and to stave off the visual of Bess on a date. Or in thermal underwear. Or in underwear period.

  I needed more information. “How does this basket lunch auction thing work again?” Other than the occasional girl’s night at Cappy’s Tavern, where I watched the mating dance of the inevitably drunk, I had little sense of the singles scene in town.

  “It’s stupid.” Bess put in her two cents worth. “And it’s sexist.” That was a word I hadn’t expected to hear her say.

  Sitting in her chair at the head of the table—we met in the back of the town office—Martha took offense. “What are you on about? There’s nothing sexist about a basket lunch.”

  “You might as well just put every single woman in town in hooker clothes and auction them off to the highest bidder. It amounts to the same even if you’re trying to romanticize it by calling it a picnic date.”

  Seated to my left, Patricia let out a tiny snort. I so wanted to do the same.

  “That’s a hideous thing to say.” Outrage rang through Martha’s voice. “You’re a sour old thing with a shriveled-up prune for a soul.”

  “Well, it beats turning into a pimp.” Bess leaned forward in her chair, pointing a gnarled and shaking finger at Martha. “What do you think of that?”

  I felt Patricia’s body shaking, and my mistake was turning my head just enough to see her face. Above tightly-pressed lips, her eyes twinkled with silent laughter. The kind of laughter that’s contagious. My lips twitched, but I managed to maintain control.

  “Why, I never!” Martha exclaimed.

  Bess never missed a beat. “And that’s half your problem right there.”

  “Okay. That’s enough.” If I didn’t put a stop to this conversation soon, I’d be joining Patricia in a fit of the giggles.

  “Excuse me for thinking we could top off the playground
fund and make some romance at the same time.” Arms folded, Martha glared at Bess.

  Bess glared back. “Butt out of people’s love lives, and keep your fingers out of town folk’s pockets during heating season. Oil costs the earth these days, and we're all going broke just trying to stay warm.”

  “It’s five hundred dollars, not five thousand. We’d only need fifty singles to pay ten bucks each. I doubt that’s enough to break the bank,” Martha pointed out with fake sweetness.

  “Fifty single people?” Bess rolled her eyes. “In Mooselick River?”

  “I think we can all agree the basket lunch is off the table.” I made a poor choice of words.

  “We need to do something to pull in that last five hundred dollars if we’re going to have the playground updated by May.” Martha glared at Bess, but she was talking to me. “If you have a better suggestion, I’d like to hear it.”

  Patricia was the one laughing, but somehow, I was the one getting the ice treatment from Martha.

  “It’s winter, we’ve had a lot of snow, and that means one thing in Maine. Snowmobiles.”

  Ice fishing and trail riding were some of the big tourist draws this time of year.

  “The trails run right along the edge of town on the way to Hackinaw, so why not partner up with the snowmobile club and see if we can come up with something fun? Maybe do our take on a poker run.”

  Arms still crossed over her ample bosom, Martha maintained her stoic expression. She might be using the argument with Bess as fuel, but when she asked how I planned to turn a poker run into a romantic Valentine’s day venture, it seemed she was still set on the idea of finding me a man. Even if her intentions were good, and that was a given, I didn’t appreciate the meddling.

  Finally in control of herself, Patricia spoke up. “You can’t count on having enough snow for trail-riding in mid-February—even if we have plenty on the ground now. One good thaw would send the whole thing down the tubes, and for what? We have months yet to come up with the rest of the playground money.”

  Tapping her fingers on the table, Martha had to admit, “You’re right, Patty.”

  I sensed a but coming.

  “But—” And there it was. “We have to do something, don’t we? Look how much attention we got for the lighting contest.”

  Well, duh, there was a murder at the lighting contest, and a high profile one at that.

  “Listen.” I decided to toss an idea out there. “There are plenty of people who are single by choice, and even more who would be mortified to participate in a public dating ritual. Why don’t we dispense with trying to pair people up and focus on helping people feel less lonely on Valentine’s Day.”

  I had their attention.

  “You’ve got that look on your face.” Martha lit up. “You have an idea.”

  “I do. I think we should sponsor an event to bring awareness to shelter animals. Specifically to get as many of them adopted as we can. We’ll host it here in town, advertise the event state-wide, and raise the playground money by selling something during the event. I’m thinking homemade dog treats, maybe.”

  “I don’t hate it,” Martha mused. “And getting animals out of shelters is a noble cause.”

  Bess was a cat person, and Patty raised chinchillas, so they were all in for anything that helped animals. With Martha on board, we hit the planning stage with a vengeance, and I added calling shelters to see how many would participate to my list of things to do for the week.

  Best of all, I’d put an end to Martha’s matchmaking efforts, at least for the time being. I felt good about the plan when I left the town office and headed toward Curated Collections.

  “What are you doing?”

  I wasn’t actually trying to sneak up on Jacy and Neena when I slipped through the back door of the shop, but because they were standing side by side with binoculars practically pressed up against the front windows, neither woman heard me come in.

  “You shouldn’t scare a pregnant woman like that,” Jacy had one hand pressed to her belly, the other to her heart. She searched my face for signs of distress but didn’t bring up the topic of Winston, for which I was thankful.

  “Sorry, I thought you heard me come in.” Leaning first right and then left, I tried to get a look out the window, but Jacy was in the way, so I moved over closer to Neena. “What’s going on? Fender bender?”

  Neena reluctantly handed me her binoculars and stepped back to let me take her place. “Not exactly. We’ve been enjoyin’ the show at the place next to the bait shop.”

  With the cold snap digging its claws into the January day, we were right in the middle of bundle-up season, but a good look at the back of the man painting the wall opposite the window could heat a woman’s blood better than any warm coat.

  “Still no idea what’s going in there?” There was no sign on the building yet, so it was anyone’s guess.

  “Oh,” Jacy said, reaching around to press her fist against her lower back, then waddled over to settle on a love seat that was for sale. “We have no idea. I’ve been trying to get Neena to run over and check things out, but she refuses to go. As if I can’t be left alone for five minutes. Peanut isn’t due for almost a month.”

  Neena turned and fisted her hands on her hips. “I would if I could trust you to stay out of trouble for that long.”

  As close as the two women had become during the process of opening a business together, they still bickered like children. Jacy rolled her eyes. “I’d have got myself out in another minute.”

  Neena tilted her head and explained. “This one was hankerin’ for cucumbers yesterday, so I figured I’d be nice and go to the grocery store for some. I wasn’t gone ten minutes, and what do I find when I come back?”

  “Don’t make it more dramatic than it was.” Jacy took over and tried to downplay the story. “I went out back to grab a small bin of books because I wanted to put some on that nice shelf we took in the other day. But the bin was lighter than I expected, and I overbalanced when I stood up.”

  Shaking her head, Neena cut back in. “Overbalanced herself into a big box of throw pillows, is what she did. I came back from the store and found her wavin’ her arms and legs around and lookin’ like a flipped-over turtle.”

  “On a normal day, a customer would have helped me up, and you’d never have known anything happened,” Jacy sulked.

  Business had been slow everywhere in town since the start of the flu epidemic right before Christmas.

  “Are you guys going to be okay if things don’t pick up soon?” I gave Jacy a reprieve by changing the subject slightly. Businesses came and went pretty quickly in small towns. I’d hate for Curated Collections to be one of the ones that didn’t make it beyond a few months.

  Nodding, Jacy smiled at Neena. “We will because caution is Neena’s middle name.”

  “Well, that makes me sound like an old maid, but when things were booming in the fall, I made sure we put back enough to cover us for a couple of months in case the late winter months were slow.”

  “We get a fair amount of local business when people are out and about, more than enough to keep the doors open, and we’ve been expanding our online presence. But banking up some extra was a saving grace since we’re not seeing more than the occasional tourist passing through.”

  “Don’t say that in front of Martha,” I said, shaking my head. “She’s half ready to start a petition to build an ice hotel or something worse. I’ve only just stopped her from trying to turn the town into some sort of singles attraction for Valentine’s day.”

  “That doesn’t sound like the worst idea.” Jacy had the same rabid light in her eyes I’d seen in Martha’s, and I vowed then and there to keep those two away from each other at all costs. Neena would help, I could tell because she’d gone pale with horror.

  Giggling, Jacy shifted into a more comfortable position on the love seat. “You should see your faces, the both of you. You look like deer in headlights.”

  Concentrating, I
relaxed my face.

  “I wasn’t talking,” she continued, “about the singles thing. Not specifically, but the ice hotel. There’s something there.”

  Neena pressed her palm to her temple as if to stave off a sudden pain. “You can’t be serious. Do you have any idea how much that would cost?”

  “Not a hotel,” Jacy flapped her hand to wave the notion away. “But what about doing something simpler, like an ice bar? I mean, I know you’re trying to raise funds for the playground and all, but something that drew more traffic into Mooselick would benefit all the businesses in town.”

  I had to admit, the idea had merit, only with one or two drawbacks.

  “A bar is good, but I’m not seeing much benefit to businesses that don’t stay open late.”

  “That’s easy,” Jacy had a ready answer. “We could do two versions, one that’s open earlier for the kids…maybe an ice cream bar with a Valentine's theme. Then, in the evening, change over to an adult venue.”

  “Get Cappy's to supply and sell the liquor, and the Kiwanis club to handle the ice cream, then we could sell raffle tickets to benefit the playground fund.” Neena got into the swing of it. “Of course, the cost of the ice blocks and someone to carve them is the only wild card, but I’m betting you know someone for that, right Everly?”

  “I might.” One name popped into my head. “Let me make a call before I talk to Martha. This might be a better idea than the one I had for doing a pet adoption event because more businesses stand to benefit. Though it does have the potential for her to twist it into some type of romantic thing.”

  “Maybe there’s a way to do both. Either way, I’m sure you can rein her in, and now that I’ve solved your Martha problem, you owe me.” Jacy’s wicked grin sent my good spirits into a nosedive. “I promise not to move from this spot unless a customer shows up so you can go over and see what’s what at the new place. The curiosity isn’t good for Peanut.”